


Inertia

by vivaforever597



Category: Where on Earth is Carmen Sandiego?
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-03
Updated: 2016-01-03
Packaged: 2018-05-11 13:33:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 454
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5628406
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vivaforever597/pseuds/vivaforever597
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Snowfall no longer holds any meaning for Carmen. Neither does any weather, at any time, in any place.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Inertia

**Author's Note:**

  * For [kmo](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kmo/gifts).



> Birthday fic for kmo! Prompt: "Carmen + snow."

_Inertia: noun. The tendency of a body in motion to remain in motion._

One thing no one tells you about endlessly traveling the world is that eventually, weather loses its meaning as a marker. Spend enough time flitting between the Northern and Southern Hemispheres, and you forget if summer means June or January, if winter means December or July. But even more than that, when you've spent years working not around a regular employer's schedule, but around the events at any place you'd like to burgle, holidays lose their meaning. My mind recognizes that November 11 means Armistice Day, but my body has forgotten. More often than not the past few years, I've spent that day planning a robbery, or carrying it out. No solemn observation here.

I was reminded of that this morning, standing on the balcony of my hotel room, sipping my coffee as the lightest snowfall drifted down. Some part of me thought it was strange to see snow in Nashville, if not unheard of, but I hadn't taken that much note of it. Nashville may as well have been New York or Montréal, or Stockholm, or Ulan Bataar, as far as I was concerned. But it was an unusually slow day for me, forced to lie in wait for my actions the previous day to take effect before I could continue my plan. And so I aimlessly turned on the television to see local news reports on the citywide panic over a few flakes. I chuckled to myself: this could do us well, I thought. The more the local cops were focused on digging people out of inch-tall snowbanks, the less heed they'd pay a shadowy figure or two around the Opry.

I shook my head and chuckled. There was nothing else to do, I thought; I may as well go out and see it all for myself. I pulled a light sweater over my blouse and jeans, careful to choose one in a lovely jade green, rather than my usual red or black or grey. People never seemed to recognize me, as if they didn't consider that the person walking down the sidewalk next to them could be the larger-than-life archcriminal they saw on the news at night, but a little subtlety never hurt. A few moments later, I stepped out of the hotel doors into the crisp, cool, dry air. Something in it reminded me of my writer's refuge in Switzerland... I smiled at the people around me walking gingerly, as if afraid that any step could lead to a sprained ankle. I tread no more lightly than usual in my short heels. I was at home in any weather at any time, I thought. In any place.


End file.
